


the world will always be there, and so will i

by potentiallythiswillbegay



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV 2020)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Found Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Missing Scene, Open Ending, Sunset Curve as found family, its the boys thinking about bobby and being sad, set after other side of hollywood (episode), we love bobby in this household but here the boys ar ehurting because of his actions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-22 11:34:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30038082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/potentiallythiswillbegay/pseuds/potentiallythiswillbegay
Summary: Luke, Reggie and Alex, having learnt about Trevor Wilson earlier that day, lie in the quiet garage of the Molina's house and think about their old bandmate and what 'life' means to them in 2020.-------Or, introspection and a missing scene after 1x05, where the boys try and process the new version of Bobby they've learned about.
Relationships: Alex Mercer & Luke Patterson & Reggie Peters (Julie and The Phantoms), Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Alex Mercer & Luke Patterson & Reggie Peters
Comments: 5
Kudos: 26





	the world will always be there, and so will i

**Author's Note:**

> working title: everyone’s broken when it comes to stolen music and stolen lives  
> not really connected to my other works but can be read to be if you want.  
> fic title is from so will i - ben platt, because i woke up and chose pain.

When Julie turns her laptop around to show a picture of a face Luke knew as well as his own, he feels an intense ache in his chest, a phantom stab to where his heart would be if it still beat.

Alex hits Reggie’s arm, and Luke can imagine both of their faces dropping from amusement to pure horror as they take in the picture in front of them.

“That’s Bobby.” The words are easy enough to say, coming out clear as if hundreds of memories don’t try to choke him up on the way out.

The others keep talking, Alex telling Julie who Bobby was to her disbelief, Reggie commenting on the fact that Bobby was now _old_ (Luke thinks about how they would be too if they hadn’t died, but he knows that train of thought won’t end well), but Luke’s mind catches on what started the conversation, and he straightens up and asks her the question he dreads hearing the answer to.

“Julie… what were his other hits?” Alex turns to face him, concern in his eyes as he processes what’s happened, and Luke can practically feel the tension burning from Reggie, even though he can’t see his face.

It feels like a bad dream, learning what Bobby had done after they died, and all the ways he had found the success they dreamed of achieving as Sunset Curve.

As a family.

Luke lets himself be swept up by the anger and hurt, messing with Bobby and planning revenge, so much so that he doesn’t stop and think until they’re in the studio that night, without a band and without a plan.

He’s lying on the couch, Reggie on a stool and Alex sideways on the armchair, and in a rare moment, all three are silent.

Reggie speaks first. “Julie quit the band.”

“Yeah.” Alex sighs.

“We messed up.”

“No kidding.”

“We need to apologise.”

Alex turns his head to face Reggie, his expression patient like too many other bad nights from their lives. “Yeah. We do. Properly, as soon as we can.”

Reggie frowns, thinking. “We can’t do anything until tomorrow, since she’s staying with Flynn, and we can’t exactly bombard her at school.”

Alex nods, Reggie’s logical way of speaking calming some of his anxieties, but both fall into restless silence as the elephant in the room is avoided.

Finally, Luke speaks, his voice quiet but present. “He got everything we wanted, by taking everything we built together.” Alex and Reggie don’t say anything, but Luke knows they’re listening as he continues, “Everything those songs meant is gone. Everything Bobby was is gone.”

“He’s not even Bobby, he’s _Trevor_ ,” Reggie mutters darkly, the tone uncharacteristically serious for him, but Luke knows why, the same way he knows why Alex was picking at the sleeves of his hoodie again.

Sunset Curve finding success was bigger than just the fame and glory of being a famous band, to all four of them it was about proving something to the families that were supposed to love them regardless, showing someone that they were worth it and deserving of it despite what they were told. Their parents: overprotective and cautious, loud and relentless, bigoted and cold, or absent yet demanding. Sunset Curve meant connection, escape, freedom, and a true family. Unconditional love and acceptance while creating incredible music together. All four of the boys always had each other over the faults of their flesh and blood, and they always thought they held each other’s values.

Twenty-five years had changed that.

“I wrote those songs to mean something. Four people in the whole world knew what they really meant-” _Some of them_ , he thinks but doesn’t say. “-and the one person that knew and lived past that day destroyed everything, and now they’re barely worth the paper I wrote them on.”

Luke throat closes up as he chokes out the last words, and Alex and Reggie are on him in a second, the three piled on far too close for such a small couch, but Luke would rather feel that horrendous jolt from earlier than have them move any further away.

“It’s been twenty-five years, and he’s been left alone,” Alex murmurs, eyes sad.

Luke squints at him, his voice quiet. “Alex, are you seriously trying to defend him?

“No, but we don’t exactly know what his life was like after we died. He’s Bobby… what did he have other than us? His family?” 

Bobby’s family, who had always expected more, wanting perfection from their oldest son, but only in the way they saw it. His family, who never wanted him involved in music, to the point that their son escaped to his grandfather’s garage for a safe space.

“What are you saying? That we should find a way to talk to him, forgive him?” Reggie asks incredulously. 

Alex pauses for a second. “No. I don’t know. Not yet, at least. We can’t keep being stuck in the past like this. Bobby- _Trevor_ is something else.” 

As silence falls over the three again, Luke finally realises what the ache in his chest that had been there since he learned about Trevor is. He assumed it was anger, fuelling him on and burning hot with every reminder of what was stolen, but he understands as it aches at Reggie’s next words.

“I miss him. I miss _our_ Bobby.” Reggie whispers in a choked voice.

Luke misses him. Bobby was his brother, who unlocked the studio for him when he ran away from home, who cried when Alex came out because he hated that Alex felt afraid, who had to be held back from causing a riot when Reggie was late to a rehearsal with a poorly hidden bruise circling his arm. Luke had held Bobby when he had broken down over his family’s ridiculous expectations, run into fights side-by-side with him, laughed until their ribs hurt more times than he could count over a mis-sung lyric, knew his look of determination as an exact mirror of his own.

Bobby was family, just as much as Alex and Reggie, and losing him like this felt like losing a limb.

“I miss him too,” Luke whispers back, and Alex doesn’t hesitate in wrapping his arms around him and Reggie, murmuring agreement and trying to offer each other the comfort of what they have left.

When they died, then came back to life all in the span of what felt like an hour, remembering Bobby had hurt. It was easy to act casual and dismiss Bobby as having moved on, but Luke hated to think of what had happened to him. Even playing with the boys now, and then with Julie, there were moments he thought of something Bobby would laugh at and open his mouth to say it, then freeze at the spot where he would never stand.

Maybe he, Reggie and Alex were the ones to die, but right now in the studio, it feels like they’re mourning Bobby instead.

Luke voices this to the others, and Reggie frowns. “Bobby is dead. He’s Trevor now.”

Alex looks at him. “What would we have done if one of us was the only one left?”

“Not stolen music, for one,” Reggie says quickly.

“Okay, yeah, but again- Twenty-five years. We don’t know what happened to put him here.” Alex raises a hand to cut off Luke before he can get a word out, “Stealing music is what put him here, I know, but he’s also a whole-ass adult. He’s, what, 42? He has a daughter. We don’t know him.”

Alex shifts slightly, and Luke and Reggie don’t even have to exchange a look to know they both recognise Alex’s body language. None of them say anything, but in a minute they’re lying half on top of each other on the floor and decisively talking about anything but Bobby. 

Reggie fills the night air by talking about movies and shows he heard about at the Hollywood Ghost Club he wants to see, wondering if he can find them on the youngest Molina’s laptop. Luke hums parts of modern songs he was trying to get his head around, smiling as Reggie’s fingers play along to the melodies on his thighs. Alex mentions posters he’s seen on the streets, rainbows, flags, and words he didn’t ever see so publically while they were alive.

Reggie doesn’t say the movies he knows Bobby would love, Luke doesn’t sing the songs that remind him of the younger boy, and Alex doesn’t think long about the quiet resemblances between Carrie and her father when he was younger.

They didn’t have a band at the moment - “We’ve gotta apologise to Julie, that’ll be first thing tomorrow.” “Of course, Luke.” - and they didn’t have what they used to, but they still had the three of them now, and that would always be enough.

 _We’re the only family we’re ever gonna need_.

The family changed, but it was still the three of them, shoulder-to-shoulder against the world.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on [tumblr](http://wlwillex.tumblr.com/).


End file.
